Kolya on 28/5/2009 at 07:53
I tried to read John Irving's "A prayer for Owen Meany", as it was recommended to me, but it was terrible.
Irving's style is cramped with extraneous details and a cowardly humour that always goes on expense of the characters you're supposed to care about. Insertions are his favourite way to add even more wish-wash into every single sentence.
After 50 pages he had introduced about 25 characters. None of them approached any more depth than a cartoon character. Including the titular Owen Meany who is a super-small 10 year old kid SPOUTING WISE REMARKS IN CAPS ALL THE FUCKING TIME. And the talking-black-hole-narrator who manages to detail his beloved mother's early and violent death in a completely emotionless way, but in fact with a smirk.
And of course the baseball-coach is fat and down-to-earth and the cop is a bit stupid... But it doesn't matter at all, because they appear and vanish from the scene like tomfools in a cheap and charmeless varieté. And you soon end up feeling incredibly bored by all the dribble of an author who has replaced quality for quantity in every imaginable way.
nicked on 28/5/2009 at 12:51
Quote Posted by Vivian
Unless you're totally put off him now, I reckon you should read 'The Player of Games' before you make your mind up finally. That's probably his best SF book.
Is that the second one in the Culture series? I loved Consider Phlebas and want to read the rest at some point.
I also loved Against a Dark Background, because it's just full of utterly unsympathetic characters having really bad things happen to them, but is still extremely compelling and interesting.
SubJeff on 28/5/2009 at 13:02
Am I supposed to read them in a specific order? I was given Consider Phlebas by someone who is a fan of the series. It came recommended. I think I might just go for the Foundation series instead. I'm not reading any sci-fi at the moment but I've thinking about Flowers for Algernon for a while. Or The Drowned World. I tend to like that oldskool sci-fi. The Fifth Head of Cerberus was all win.
Vivian on 28/5/2009 at 13:30
It makes some sense to read the culture series in order (Player of games is the second), but you don't have to: each book is a self contained story, but the bits of the culture they're concerned with makes a fairly logical progression.
Foundation series is pretty hokey, but I'm not a massive fan of Asimov's writing (or lack thereof! great themes, but I can't remember a single story not reading like it was written by a biochemist). Drowned World's on my list, I was pretty impressed by ballards autobiography. Have you read any of Margaret Atwoods 'speculative fiction' (i.e. sci-fi putting on airs and graces)? Oryx and Crake was brilliant.
Queue on 28/5/2009 at 14:19
Quote Posted by Kolya
I tried to read John Irving's "A prayer for Owen Meany", as it was recommended to me, but it was terrible ... end up feeling incredibly bored by all the dribble of an author who has replaced quality for quantity in every imaginable way.
You are so right with this one. That book sucked.
I've seen a lot of this writing--completely unfocused, convoluted, and heavily stylistic to hide the fact they can't write well. It's like that awful
Citizen Vince novel by Jess Walter, the thing won and Edgar Award (Best Novel) for fucks-sake and was filled with fragmented sentences, improper usage of ellipsis, screaming text, and littered with passages that read as if you are being machine-gunned, like this: "The mailman? No way. Clueless. That leaves Doug and Lenny. He can't imagine Len has the brains, or Doug the balls. The both seem harmless." Come on, a High Schooler can write better than this.
But, this does seem to be what all the "hipster" younger publishers are looking for now-a-days.
Starrfall on 28/5/2009 at 14:21
The Reach of a Chef by Michael Rulhman. It's a re-read, and it's going stupidly slow cause I'm busy as shit!
Rulhman is hands down the best writer about the american restaurant industry. He's also worked on a few cookbooks with a few guys no one's ever heard about like Thomas Keller and Eric Ripert. (And he's got a few of his own.)
mrle01 on 28/5/2009 at 14:36
Just starting Arkady and Boris Strugatsky's The Time Wanderers (aka The Waves Extinguish the Wind). I've been reading all the books by them I could find lately (Hard to be a God, Definitely Maybe, The Ugly Swans, The Inhabited Island and Beetle in the Anthill). I only wish more of their books were translated into my language as they are very good.
I'm also reading through Kurt Vonnegut's collection of essays A Man Without a Country.
Muzman on 28/5/2009 at 15:06
I just finished "Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman :The Adventures of a Curious Character". Feynman's about the most down-to-earth physicist you can imagine. It's funny; the pull quote on the back from someone or other says that there's genius, that's merely clever, and magic, as in baffling and extraordinary. Feynman, he says, was a magician. Personally I find the complete opposite. He's so straightforward and light of touch that you can think anyone could do all the things he's done. Indeed I think that's the effect he's going for.
Now I'm reading Voltaire's 'Candide' and commentaries thereon. I thought I'd read it but I think I've only read stuff about it before now. It's quite the brutally black comedy.
Still snailing through the opening bits of 'The Decameron' too. Comparing the various translations and language updates is fun. A dynamite line in one will be stumblingly meh in another, and vice versa.
Stitch on 28/5/2009 at 16:39
Quote Posted by Queue
I've seen a lot of this writing--completely unfocused, convoluted, and heavily stylistic to hide the fact they can't write well.
Surely you can't be talking about John Irving. A Prayer for Owen Meany wasn't a masterpiece by any stretch but Irving is pretty solid writer.
